Investigating the effect of gamma irradiation on the structural, optical, and electrical properties of bismuth-modified strontium titanate ceramics

For next-generation technology, dielectric materials with narrow band gap energies, significant capacitance, low dissipation factor, and exceptional thermal stability are needed. Researchers have pursued numerous approaches to obtain such materials. This study systematically compared the structural, optical, and electrical properties of Sr0.96Bi0.04TiO3 (Bi:ST) ceramics before and after gamma irradiation. All samples had a cubic phase with a Pm3m space group, reducing in lattice parameter and unit cell volume, and a decline in the crystallite size with an increase in the gamma exposure, according to an XRD analysis and structural refinement. Raising the gamma irradiation dosage improved the absorption spectra, and modifying the bandgap energy suggests that gamma irradiation causes defects to occur in the strontium titanate (STO) host lattice. The XPS investigation supports this. At ambient temperature, the polarization vs. electric field (PE) hysteresis loop was evaluated at 10 Hz before and after gamma irradiation. We observed that the breakdown strength and maximum polarization increase after gamma irradiation until 50 kGy and then decrease. In response to gamma radiation, the maximum energy storage density (Wrec = 0.612 J/cm3) and energy storage efficiency (over 95%) is achieved in the sample irradiated by 50 kGy. Meanwhile, the sample irradiated with 50 kGy showed good thermal stability at 25–80 °C. From the results obtained, we hypothesize that gamma rays can be considered one of the easiest methods to manipulate the bandgap energy and improve energy storage performance, which may be utilized in electronics development for next-generation technology.